Steam Community :: Guide :: How to Create a Map with Vast Amount of Planets

Store Page

Galactic Civilizations III

All Discussions Screenshots Artwork Broadcasts Videos Workshop News Guides Reviews

Galactic Civilizations III > Guides > Sycloness's Guides

56 ratings

How to Create a Map with Vast Amount of Planets

By Sycloness

Stardock limited the amount of planets that could spawn on a map to help improve performance on some player computers. This change drasticly effected how much I enjoied the game. I wanted to pass on how I learned to overcome the planet nerf to get back the game play I like on maps.

Award

Created by

Sycloness
Online

Category: Modding or Configuration

Languages: English

Posted

Updated

Sep 11, 2015 @ 3:09am

Sep 28, 2015 @ 2:01pm

4,633	Unique Visitors
109	Current Favorites

Guide Index

Overview

Introduction

How to Increase the Amount of Planets Found on a Map Size

How to Increase the Amount of Habitable Planets

How to Increase the Amount of Planets Found Around a Star Type

How to Change the Planet Level on Special Planets

How to Change the Amount of Planets that Spawn on a Map

Comments

Introduction

This is for the players like me that like the vastness of space full of planets. I know that is not the case but I like to play like there is a planet or two in every star system. I also do not like small worlds I only end up colonizing them to remove them from the game. With the information found in this guide you can make the galaxy have as little or as much planets as you wish.

Locate your game file:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Galactic Civilizations III\data\Game

All changes will be made to xml documents found in this folder.

Note all changes that are made are one time and do not get updated to defaults for a patch.

How to Increase the Amount of Planets Found on a Map Size

Edit your MapSizeDefs.xml. Under the map size you play edit the base about of planets and set half to habitable.
<InternalName>Large</InternalName>
<Base>400</Base>
<MaxHabitablePlanets>200</MaxHabitablePlanets>

How to Increase the Amount of Habitable Planets

Edit your MapSetupDef.xml. Under the Abundant map settings section increase the precentage:

<PlanetFrequencyExp>0.95</PlanetFrequencyExp>
<HabitablePlanets>0.95</HabitablePlanets>

Note: .01 = 1% and .1 = 100%

How to Increase the Amount of Planets Found Around a Star Type

Edit your StarSystemDefs.xml. Scroll down past the race star defaults (unless you wish to edit those too) and find the System Group defaults for stars. I found all the yellow and purple stars and edited how many planets are found around the stars.

<StarSystem>
<InternalName>System00</InternalName>
<OrbitLane>
<LaneType>Star</LaneType>
<Body>
<BodyType>UnaryStar</BodyType>
<BodyDef>YellowStar</BodyDef>
</Body>
</OrbitLane>
<OrbitLane>
<LaneType>DeadZone</LaneType>
<MinPlanets>0</MinPlanets>
<MaxPlanets>1</MaxPlanets>
</OrbitLane>
<OrbitLane>
<LaneType>HabitableZone</LaneType>
<MinPlanets>1</MinPlanets>
<MaxPlanets>3</MaxPlanets>
</OrbitLane>
<OrbitLane>
<LaneType>OuterZone</LaneType>
<MinPlanets>0</MinPlanets>
<MaxPlanets>2</MaxPlanets>
<Body>
<BodyType>Asteroid</BodyType>
<BodyDef>NormalAsteroid</BodyDef>
</Body>
</OrbitLane>
</StarSystem>

How to Change the Planet Level on Special Planets

Edit your PlanetTraitDef.xml. Find the trait types and edit them to your tastes.

<PlanetTrait>
<InternalName>SereneWorld</InternalName>
<DisplayName>SereneWorld_Name</DisplayName>
<Description>SereneWorld_Dec</Description>
<RelativeWeight>9</RelativeWeight>
<PlanetClassSelect>
<MinPlanetClass>10</MinPlanetClass>
<MaxPlanetClass>20</MaxPlanetClass>
<Weight>95</Weight>
</PlanetClassSelect>
<PlanetClassSelect>
<MinPlanetClass>25</MinPlanetClass>
<MaxPlanetClass>26</MaxPlanetClass>
<Weight>5</Weight>
</PlanetClassSelect>
<EffectModifier>
<EffectType>InfluencePerTurn</EffectType>
<Target>
<TargetType>Colony</TargetType>
</Target>
<BonusType>Multiplier</BonusType>
<Value>0.25</Value>
</EffectModifier>
<EffectModifier>
<EffectType>GoodsAndServices</EffectType>
<Target>
<TargetType>Colony</TargetType>
</Target>
<BonusType>Multiplier</BonusType>
<Value>0.25</Value>
</EffectModifier>
</PlanetTrait>

You can also edit the chance of the planet trait spawning by changing the RelativeWeight.

<RelativeWeight>9</RelativeWeight>

How to Change the Amount of Planets that Spawn on a Map

Edit your GalCiv3MapsDefs.xml. Change the percentages a planet level spawn rate. Just make sure the numbers add up to 100. You can also edit the default planet levels if you wish.

<DefaultPlanetClassSelect>
<MinPlanetClass>4</MinPlanetClass>
<MaxPlanetClass>8</MaxPlanetClass>
<Weight>1</Weight>
</DefaultPlanetClassSelect>
<DefaultPlanetClassSelect>
<MinPlanetClass>10</MinPlanetClass>
<MaxPlanetClass>14</MaxPlanetClass>
<Weight>40</Weight>
</DefaultPlanetClassSelect>
<DefaultPlanetClassSelect>
<MinPlanetClass>12</MinPlanetClass>
<MaxPlanetClass>18</MaxPlanetClass>
<Weight>35</Weight>
</DefaultPlanetClassSelect>
<DefaultPlanetClassSelect>
<MinPlanetClass>18</MinPlanetClass>
<MaxPlanetClass>24</MaxPlanetClass>
<Weight>24</Weight>
</DefaultPlanetClassSelect>

27 Comments

< >

M14 May 18, 2021 @ 6:03am

make your map

ll62518475 Jan 27, 2021 @ 12:37pm

Sorry for necro.

ll62518475 Jan 27, 2021 @ 12:36pm

Can I change <RelativeWeight> to numbers like 0.1, or does it only work with integral numbers like 1, 2, 3, etc.?

Sycloness [author] Sep 8, 2020 @ 12:27pm

I have not played this game in years. Too many changes that restricted my game play to dumb down the AI so they could beat me.

dan5tr4n63r Sep 8, 2020 @ 11:38am

The section "How to Increase the Amount of Habitable Planets" is flawed(maybe it worked in the past)...i have my files in the mod directory...i did as it was written and i got no habitable planets...then changed 0.95 to 3(in the original file is 2.5) and 0.95(original file is 100) to 100 and the habitable planets were back...great guide overall...thank you

Sycloness [author] May 17, 2020 @ 3:58pm

I have not played in ages, but the info should still work. I am guessing you found the files, opened them, and tried to edit them? That should work. One thing I did notice later is every update the edited files would get reset. To fix that you need to copy the files and edit them inside a folder in your mod folder. Updates never effect files in your mod folder.

DLWalsh May 15, 2020 @ 3:00pm

I am unable to edit any of these files. What am I doing wrong?

Sycloness [author] Feb 23, 2019 @ 2:25pm

I have not played in about a year, this worked back when I played.

Ineedtostopchangingusername Feb 19, 2019 @ 3:27pm

When I did it I got LESS planets. Also the latest update makes abundant planets option REALLY abundant.

Sycloness [author] Feb 2, 2017 @ 1:10am

Well it will set up a system that I like to play with vast amounts of large planets. Now we all know that is not realistic or we would have gamers playing on more than just Earth by now.

< >